tips

Working as a freelancer becomes more fashionable nowadays and therefore working at home as well. Especially the fact that one can set it’s own hours is a pleasing side effect. So setting up your working place effectively is an important part of working at home. A well organized and structured office makes the working hours at home easier and more enjoyable. Here are some helpful hints for freelancer to arrange their office conveniently:

basic needs for your home office

In general you shouldn’t fill up your office with stuff which is not necessary for your actual work.

• choose a quiet or separated place for your office at your flat or house, to avoid the feeling to work all time
• you’ll need a computer or even better a laptop (you can take it with you when working at a coworking space)
• a comfortable chair with a chair mat to protect your floors
• keep your office filed (even if you need your “creative chaos”, tidying up at regular intervals helps to facilitate your workday life)

“Business coaching is a practice of developing and honing business skills, to achieve substantial results in the organizational structure of a business. It helps you to improve and achieve the desired success.” But do you need a business coach?

A business coach emphasizes on the importance of interpersonal communication skills in accomplishing an assignment or a project. He helps to deal with the practical problems and identify realistic solutions to them. On woodridge you can find a list of basic responsibilities of a business coach, so you can see if you need one or not.

On Graphicdesignblender you’ll find some useful tips on how to create a healthy work-life balance when working as a freelancer. As a freelancer you need to have a compensation to your daily work. That is a problem many business owner have because you feel the success or failure right away. This pressure causes oftentimes exhaustion, burnout and mediocre work. So here are some tips:

1. Know your limits

You should not exaggerate overtimes. Working overtime can be good and can make sense, for example because you have to finish a project on time, but working working constantly can become a dangerous way of life. “Set an hour-long meeting with yourself to assess your working situation. Are you currently feeling overworked and stressed? If so, what can you say ‘no’ too?”

2. Turn it Off

Being the owner of a business lets you often run out of time. “You spend time answering emails, putting out client fires, working as a receptionist and project manager, and thinking about things like ROI and SEO for your design business. To achieve a good work/life balance at some point you’re going to have to turn things off. Turn off your computer. Turn off your internet. Turn off your phone.” And your brain of course too. Maybe you take one night so switch of you business life in total.

3. Why do you do what you do?

Ask yourself, why you are doing that work you do. Is it because of the more flexible schedule? Or the free time? “If you are consistently working more than you want and constantly stressed out, then you need to sit yourself down and have a talk. How can you change your design job to make it more like the job you want to have? Do you need to work less? Take on fewer design projects? Schedule your time better? Get out more?” Try to reflect and write down, why you became a freelancer.

4. Get passionate about something besides your work

Everybody needs a hobby. If you don’t know what else to do except working, you should look for one. “To provide some balance you’ll need to find something else you really like to do when you’re not working.” The further away from your job, the fuller your life will be.

A project plan should always be based on good risk management. Therefore you should regularly check whether the issue is possible to achieve. Suggestions for a change coming from outside the team might become risks, so to avoid unpleasant surprises, changes should always be made formally. Before implementing new ideas calculations of time- and money-cost should be made.
Furthermore, in the beginning of a project all objectives must be clearly defined:

- What is necessary to achieve the goal?
Good and regular documentation is very important. This avoids confusion and dubiety in the team. Daily team meetings can be very helpful here.
- Where are we on our way to the goal?
Good communication and organization are extremely important in team work. Therefore, it is important to accurately define the roles in a team. It might be best to document the responsibilities in written form. The work flow should always be transparent.

The leading project manager should be well trained, able to assert himself and be able to make out-of-favour decisions.

In the end of a project someone should write a final report on the project development, major problems, found solutions and achieved results. Afterwards a project reflection could be helpful to know what was solved well and what parts could be optimized for further projects.

Maybe you have some more tips for the other readers? We’d love to know your opinion.

based on : http://www.cio.de/strategien/2238887/
http://www.log-in-verlag.de/service/2006/138/SCHEMEL-Service.pdf

According to a study by the Technische Universität Dortmund in cooperation with several freelance platforms, freelancers are more prone to suffer from the burnout syndrome than permanent employees.

Especially the lack of separation between the private and the working life would be responsible for permanent exhaustion, fear, negative emotions and the inability to regenerate, the findings suggest. While permanent employees are able to switch off on their way home every day, many freelancers work at home and may end their working day merely by switching rooms.

The main reasons for the burnout syndrome are not long working hours, the study suggests, but tasks that are either difficult to manage or appear to be pointless, low esteem expressed by superiors or customers, time pressure and the pressure to produce results, the lack of exchange and interaction with colleagues, almost no breaks as well as the lack of separation between the private and the working life, as mentioned.

14% of the freelancers, who are 43 years old on average, expressed that they problaby will not be able to endure this pressure until they turn 50.

Another significant part of the interviewees stated that the limit of capability has been exceeded with the effect, that job satisfaction and intrinsic motivation already has fallen by the wayside.

Nevertheless, it is important to stress that one quarter of those interviewed does not feel exhausted or unable to regenerate. Two thirds even say that they are proud of their own performances and feel a strong or very strong positive performance orientation. Work-related stress is being perceived as positive – they have fun and feel very committed to their work.

The Technische Universität Dortmund has developed a concept for a burnout prevention programme based upon these findings that is being established through pilot projects in several parts of Germany such as Münsterland, Ruhrgebiet and Rheinland.

Nowadays, the term “workspace” does not merely relate to a physical location but has to be stretched to include virtual workspaces as well. Thanks to many online collaboration solutions, finding the right workspace for your business has become a challenging task. Provided an internet connection and a tiny budget, online collaborations can be just as productive as working together in traditional office settings.

This great post by mashable discusses different office strategies and provides some advice on choosing the right workspace…

You want to increase your market opportunities? Write a well-defined profile of your skills and know-how using the “checklist” of the coaching company Karriere². Show your expertise and define your role: eg Project manager, copywriter, programmer or consultant. If your profile is less technical underline your methodical and personal skills.

The first step is to think of the skills that might be needed by your potential client. Think of the central arguments for these skills and adjust your profile.

Your character and the potential client:
- Who are you and what are you capable of?
- What are your knowledges and experiences?
- What is required? What is your main focus? What are the similarities?

Your Skills:
- What are your professional and personal competences?
- What is your background?
- Which experiences do you have in the industry
- Do you have language skills and international experience? If yes, please specify.
- Do you have references? (Brief Feedbacks are good!)
- Do you have publications? Please name or attach them.

Think in projects:
- First list all projects you have worked in freelance or permanent position in the last five years.
- Select the projects that relevant for your target group.
- Describe your projects in detail. Note that the following points are relevant.

1. Location and duration of the project
2. Your role
3. Applied techniques or technologies and methods
4. Point out project results!

Karriere²-founder Padideh Kaschefi says: “Compared to a chronological CV you score better by mentioning most relevant projects!”

1. Are you a morning person?
If so, you probably know the advantages of getting up early and to have finished  a good part of the work in time. However, if you are not a morning person – like me – you probably resist to get up early. There is still the evening. I discovered that the late starters can be productive in the morning as well. In the beginning it may be an obstacle, but the feeling of having done so much before lunch as usual in the late evening, is worth it. Not to mention all the free evenings too …

2. Structure your day
If you work in a company, there are small breaks almost automatically. You go into the kitchen, make yourself a coffee – for some smoking breaks are mandatory anyway – and relax a bit. Your eyes may thank you when they are allowed to rest on something other than the monitor for sometime. As a freelancer, it is sometimes difficult to make breaks. Therefore, plan your working day as much detailed as possible – including the pauses. You will get used to it, to keep your own guidelines.

3. No interruptions
A new notice at Facebook, mails are coming in, the cell phone rings – and you lose your track. If you want to concentrate on your work, it is important that all these small disturbances are off. So you don’t have a excuse to be distracted. Plan fixed times for mails, social networks and the phone (the phone especially if you don’t have a separate business cell phone) and stick to it – just like the breaks.

4. Avoid loneliness
Spend the lunch break for example with friends or a business lunch appointment. A new trend are coworking spaces. You can find a detailed list about coworking spaces here.

On computerwoche.de you can find 8 tips which help to make your work more efficient.

1. To-Do list
As basis for organized work create To-do lists. Important here is not to have more than one list in order to avoid confusion.

2. Schedule
Provide sufficient time for upcoming tasks and enter them in a daily or weekly schedule. Prefer three hours instead of two. If time left over, you can use them for storage or other tasks.

3. The “holy area”
The “holy area” is a 60 x 60 cm area on the workplace, which keeps only the documents that concern the actual work. This area ensures that we can concentrate fully on the very important activities.

4. E-mail
Schedule fixed times for answering e-mails. Unimportant e-mails should be deleted immediately; arranged are moved into folders, so that the inbox is always clear.

5. Interaction with colleagues
As regards to colleague, who simply pop up with new tasks or questions, a friendly but definite action is recommended. A firm timesheet for talking time-consuming peers could help.

6. Tools
Simple but effective is to have all necessary tools such as punch, tacker, paper and pen nearby and easy to reach, so the desktop remains clearly arranged.

7. Deposit station
Handle all the collected documents in unused time slots. It is important to sort all of the completed documents, which do not need to be repealed, out to the trash or other place, where they don’t get in you way.

8. Leisure time
Before closing the desk, it should be cleared and all the unfinished tasks transferred in the schedule for the next few days. Only with cleared and empty desk, the new working day can start unstressed.

Apple iPad has already been sold three million times 80 days after launch. And there are more and more Apps for the iPad – with the result that it becomes increasingly confusing and nobody really knows, which apps are good and which are not.Computerwoche.de has compiled the ten most popular apps iPad:

Remote Desktop
Numbers
IM +
Good Reader for iPad
AirVideo
Atomic Web Browser
sipgate
Citrix Receiver
Keynote
Dropbox

You can find more information aboute the apps here!